Typological Mash Up

Bertrand Goodhue’s Nebraska State Capitol is a typological tour de force that combines a Beaux Arts four courtyard plan with a dome-topped tower that deploys the most up-to-date compositional and syntactical strategies for skyscraper design. What was unique about the project was the way that it transformed what had been conceived as an urban building type – famously sculpted by Hugh Ferriss to allow sunlight to penetrate to Manhattan’s streets – into a uniquely American civic expression. The resulting free-standing ensemble has both the paradigmatic clarity and sense of ritual of Fischer von Erlach’s reconstructions of the important building complexes of Antiquity, including the walled compound of Diocletian’s Palace in Split and the Porcelain Tower of Nanking (Plan of Civil and Historical Architecture, 1721).

Diocletian’s Palace, Fischer von Erlach

The Porcelain Tower of Nanking, Fischer von Erlach

Like the projects from Antiquity, the Nebraska State Capitol is surrounded by massive walls with ceremonial gates and has a symbolic monument on the interior that is highly visible on the skyline.